Hildebrand in back of pack after Indy Grand Prix of Sonoma qualifying

SONOMA — Sausalito's JR Hildebrand had plenty of extra inspiration during Saturday's qualifying for the Indy Grand Prix of Sonoma. Not only was he at his home track, the 2.3-mile road course at Sonoma, but his car was emblazoned with 49ers logos and he was wearing a special racing suit made to look like a 49ers uniform.

But instead his day felt like a three-and-out, something Alex Smith is familiar with.

Hildebrand needed to be among the six fastest drivers in his half of the Qualifying 1 session to advance to the Q2 and be among the top 12 on the grid. He was among the fastest as times started rolling in, but while others improved he didn't as the clock headed towards zeroes. Hildebrand wound up ninth in his group, and is slated to start 17th in the Panther Racing No. 4 National Guard Dallara Chevy. However at least two of the cars in front of him are expected to drop behind him on the grid for engine changes and other penalties.

Will Power, the winner of the last two races here, won his third consecutive pole. The series points leader toured the reconfigured 12-turn, 2.385-mile course in 1 minute, 17.2709 seconds to beat Team Penske teammate Ryan Briscoe. Sebastien Bourdais of Dragon Racing was a surprising third.

With only one set of tires for the Q1 session, the red-banded "option" tires, Hildebrand had to manage exactly when he would attempt his fastest lap. Catch the tires at their optimum and capitalize, and he might move on to Q2. Use up the best of the tires too soon, and shoot blanks thereafter when those precious extra tenths of a second are rendered out of reach.

It appeared that Hildebrand tried too hard too soon.

"I'll take some of the responsibility for that," he admitted moments after the session. "I overdrove a couple of laps. We've got a pretty good tail wind through (Turns) 2, 3, 3A, and 4, and I think I overdrove it down into 4 on a couple laps. That might have been the two tenths that we needed to get back in (to the advancing top six)."

So Hildebrand will start where he has for most of the season, in the back half of the field. Only once has he made it out of Q1 on a road or street course in 2012. But his race pace has been as good as anyone this year, and the morning session gave the team more hope as well.

"We were struggling a bit this morning to see what we need to do, and the boys made some good changes in the right direction," Hildebrand said. "If we just continue following that path we should be looking pretty good tomorrow."

Two divergent strategies have netted Hildebrand advances through the field when he's started this far back. He has pitted early, running alone instead of being mired in traffic. He's also run fast but economically, saving fuel and tires so he can pit later and run stronger at the end of the stint.

"Being able to outlast the guys around you is definitely a key part of going fast and moving your way through the field," Hildebrand said. "I think we've got a consistent race car, and that will play a roll tomorrow."

Hildebrand got a different taste of speed earlier this week, being a passenger on the Oracle America's Cup catamaran during a heat race and then taking the tiller himself afterwards.

The responsiveness of something that size really impressed Hildebrand.

"You'd swear that it has an engine. It's super fast," he said. "It changes directions very quickly. They gave me the reins to steer the thing. And it was crazy how touchy it is. They are always trying to sail the boat with one of the hulls out of the water because it has significantly less resistance. So to get one of the hulls out of the water but to keep it from bobbing and coming down and slapping the water is extremely difficult."

In that sense there are parallels to what Hildebrand has to do in the race car.

"It's knowing exactly how much you have to lift without lifting too much, or without keeping your foot buried in it and ending up in the wall, it's sort of similar in that sense," he said. "It requires a lot of finesse."